Third party products Zeitgeist?

Currently investigating this... its really interesting looking.
Steam punk with a dash of the magical genre?

http://zeitgeistadventurepath.com/


Naval Battle Rules
http://www.rpgnow.com/product/107068/Admiral-o'-the-High-Seas%3A-The-Naval-Combat-Supplement-for-Pathfinder-%26-D%26D-4th-Edition

Well they have me intrigued.

Looking through the Player Supplement. Decently balanced Firearms and a well thought out Expertise feat for them. The Themes sound cool, but are rather weak. The campaign really intrigues me, I'll need to look into it more, but I'm thinking I'm going to buy it and run it with my group, maybe with some tweaks to bring it into the world of a novel I'm working on.

cyvaris wrote:

Looking through the Player Supplement. Decently balanced Firearms and a well thought out Expertise feat for them. The Themes sound cool, but are rather weak. The campaign really intrigues me, I'll need to look into it more, but I'm thinking I'm going to buy it and run it with my group, maybe with some tweaks to bring it into the world of a novel I'm working on.

A thread on EnWorld brought it to my attention they were discussing themes even..

My personal favorite themes are the ones that give you several power swap options. These to me really feel like a "Theme" as they differentiate my Fighter from yours. The power swaps open up new game possibilities and offer some nice secondary customization. I've been planning to do a theme overhaul, just haven't had the time.

cyvaris wrote:

My personal favorite themes are the ones that give you several power swap options. These to me really feel like a "Theme" as they differentiate my Fighter from yours. The power swaps open up new game possibilities and offer some nice secondary customization. I've been planning to do a theme overhaul, just haven't had the time.

I made heavy use of the Themes power swapping element in Darksun Character - thematically correct but made using 2 divine classes I am such a bad bad boy.


http://community.wizards.com/content/blog/786181

I checked out the free pdf stuff for zeitgeist. Looks pretty cool, actually. The gun rules are nice. Now I want to play a ranger or a artificer with guns. :)It also made me think about how easy it'd be to make a steampunk 4e campaign. So much stuff can be used as is, just extensively reflavored. A power hammer would just be a magic warhammer or maul that can add thunder damage, and/or electricity damage.

If I ran a steampunk campaign, however...I'd have to add a few things. Like a new skill called 'Engineering'. It'd be a class skill for artificers, of course. You'd have to make engineering checks to operate, repair, sabotage, or construct any advanced mechanical device. Also, I'd add a mechanics' tool kit, which would function just like thieves' tools, but confer the +2 to engineering. Another thing, to simulate steampunky prosthesis items, would be to allow anyone to have 'warforged' parts/items installed as magic items. WotC did a few cool things for warforged a few years ago in Dragon. Like a shoulder mounted hand crossbow. As well as retractable weapons, built into their forearms. I would want to draw up stats for heavy weapons too, though. Gatling guns and cannons, which would be stationary, vehicle-mounted, or large construct mounted. Crazy Tesla stuff, like lightening guns could just be lightening bolt spells...scaled for encounter or daily use.

Rules for vehicles wouldn't be that hard...if kept light, as 4e has already done. Eberron has details about a train and airships already. But, you'd just take out the 'it's powered by a bound elemental' part, and put in a steam engine, or combustion engine. And instead of arcana checks, you'd use engineering checks.

Now I wish I could find someone to DM it, lol. I'd love to play a warforged artificer (engineer) with a top hat, a great coat, and a steel moustache. Oh, and a monocle. And a clockwork familiar.

PS: totally off topic, but is anyone else having problems with the box to add a comment? I am missing the menu bar at the top (for adding a pic, selecting emoticons, doing italics/bold/etc...)

seti wrote:

I checked out the free pdf stuff for zeitgeist. Looks pretty cool, actually. The gun rules are nice. Now I want to play a ranger or a artificer with guns. :)It also made me think about how easy it'd be to make a steampunk 4e campaign. So much stuff can be used as is, just extensively reflavored. A power hammer would just be a magic warhammer or maul that can add thunder damage, and/or electricity damage.

If I ran a steampunk campaign, however...I'd have to add a few things. Like a new skill called 'Engineering'. It'd be a class skill for artificers, of course. You'd have to make engineering checks to operate, repair, sabotage, or construct any advanced mechanical device. Also, I'd add a mechanics' tool kit, which would function just like thieves' tools, but confer the +2 to engineering. Another thing, to simulate steampunky prosthesis items, would be to allow anyone to have 'warforged' parts/items installed as magic items. WotC did a few cool things for warforged a few years ago in Dragon. Like a shoulder mounted hand crossbow. As well as retractable weapons, built into their forearms.

Rules for vehicles wouldn't be that hard...if kept light, as 4e has already done. Eberron has details about a train and airships already. But, you'd just take out the 'it's powered by a bound elemental' part, and put in a steam engine, or combustion engine. And instead of arcana checks, you'd use engineering checks.

Now I wish I could find someone to DM it, lol. I'd love to play a warforged artificer (engineer) with a top hat, a great coat, and a steel moustache. Oh, and a monocle. And a clockwork familiar.

PS: totally off topic, but is anyone else having problems with the box to add a comment? I am missing the menu bar at the top (for adding a pic, selecting emoticons, doing italics/bold/etc...)

That mention of prosthetics.. reminds me - Celtic Myth is awesome they had cyborgs (nuada of the silver arm) and dudes with death ray eyes - I mean what kind of imagination is that?  and this would be around 1800 or something like that years BC. Somebody must have been an uber-Leonardo Da Vinci back then.

not having problems here? what browser?

Or, if you believe the 'history' channel...It was Ancient Aliens messing with the Celts.

Using Chrome. When I hit 'edit' it's fine, all the options are there. But, when I just post...it's a plain text box. Weird.

edit: Never mind...I think it's just a 'quick reply' box...I missed the actual 'Post Reply' button at the bottom. My bad.

Personally I think it partially just evidence of gradual contribution to a story by subsequent retelling ;p, but it can be fun to take myths at partial face value and just call it evidence that tech is sometimes much older than we think (they have archeological evidence putting things like steam engines in ancient egypt and similar so why not cybernetic limbs.) Other med-tech of fairly sophisticated nature like transplanting of skin, seems much older than most would think.

Picturing that Atlantean Steampunk culture as we type here.

Prosthetic technology probably does go back farther than we'd think. I mean, not until very recently has it advanced to a level of sophistication that couldn't be built 2000 years ago. Even in the early to mid 20th century, a medical prosthesis was a simple device; usually hand made of wood, leather, and metal. No reason the Romans (or earlier) cultures couldn't have made such things. I've seen a wooden leg from about 1930. It wasn't high tech at all, yet allowed a guy to walk (with a cane) for over a decade. Almost bought it too...But the antique store wanted more than I was willing to spend.

Nuada could have had a healed stump, that actually didn't get infected. Someone could have easily built a hand from silver. Pre-christian Celtic metal work, especially jewelry, is quite awesome. Now, the hand wouldn't have worked, lol. But, it would have looked cool. And impressed people.

The real trick back then would be surviving the limb loss. But, if by luck, decent care, and a high constitution, someone did live long enough to have a perfectly healed stump...Building a cosmetic, and somewhat functional, prosthetic would be totally possible.

Leonardo built functioning clockwork mechanical robotics as well as designing helicopters and such... it might not be a huge jump for a similar genius to have put more functionality in that hand than is "realistic" based on what we have in recorded history.

seti wrote:

The real trick back then would be surviving the limb loss. But, if by luck, decent care, and a high constitution, someone did live long enough to have a perfectly healed stump...Building a cosmetic, and somewhat functional, prosthetic would be totally possible.

The story attributes actual regrowing the limb later to a boy genius healer and the original replacement to his father. (the boy was slain for showing up dad - isnt that sweet).

Completely off topic...followed Garthanos' link....ohh that's who you are from the WOTC forums.

cyvaris wrote:

Completely off topic...followed Garthanos' link....ohh that's who you are from the WOTC forums.

Nods and Waves, Plenty of the names in the members list are consistent identities... across many forums.

To seti:  I love the idea of an Engineering Skill!!  Anyone who is designing, constructing, and maintaining any sort of device, either mundane or magical could use it.  Artificers, Trapsmiths, even some characters with blacksmithing who have to figure out how to approach a new type of armor on the fly could use it.  It can also be used for repairing objects and many other uses.

Good idea!!  

thanson02 wrote:

To seti:  I love the idea of an Engineering Skill!!  Anyone who is designing, constructing, and maintaining any sort of device, either mundane or magical could use it.  Artificers, Trapsmiths, even some characters with blacksmithing who have to figure out how to approach a new type of armor on the fly could use it.  It can also be used for repairing objects and many other uses.

Good idea!!   

By the way the ancient term would likely be "Wright", generally speaking someone good at construction projects.

thanson02 wrote:

To seti:  I love the idea of an Engineering Skill!!  Anyone who is designing, constructing, and maintaining any sort of device, either mundane or magical could use it.  Artificers, Trapsmiths, even some characters with blacksmithing who have to figure out how to approach a new type of armor on the fly could use it.  It can also be used for repairing objects and many other uses.

Good idea!!   

I actually started working on a set of skills like that but abandoned the project mainly out of lack of interest and the fact that they would become quite cumbersome.

I started working on them here.